Sestero: Disaster makes amends for 2003's The Room

Greg Sestero, “star” of The Room, is also author of the nonfiction book The Disaster Artist.
Greg Sestero, “star” of The Room, is also author of the nonfiction book The Disaster Artist.

"I was put in this film that was considered the worst movie ever made. I didn't really have any creative control over it," says actor-writer Greg Sestero. The film in question is writer-director-producer star Tommy Wiseau's 2003 head scratcher The Room. "It's hard to be in a movie that gets seen, and it's hard to be in a movie that seen as good."

In it, Wiseau plays a banker named Johnny who discovers his best friend named Mark (Sestero) is having an affair with his scheming fiancee Lisa (Juliette Danielle). While adultery and jealousy have inspired great films from people like Ernst Lubitsch (The Shop Around the Corner) and Louis Malle (Damage, The Lovers), the sex and feuding of The Room has led to relentless, unintentional laughter.

The dialogue might be a factor. When Johnny warns that he can't discuss work because it's confidential, he asks Mark, "So, how's your sex life?"

For most of us that's pretty confidential, too.

In addition to Wiseau's immortal cry of "You are tearing me apart, Lisa!," the movie also features what may be the least erotic lovemaking scenes ever filmed. The contorted couplings are not likely to be repeated, and Sestero and Danielle have a staircase encounter that would only make chiropractors salivate.

"It was pretty painful," Sestero admits.

Up from the Ashes

Curiously, Sestero isn't noticeably upset about how The Room has become a staple of late night screenings where viewers toss plastic cutlery every time a framed portrait of a spoon appears on the screen.

Inadvertently, it started a second, possibly more gratifying career. He and Tom Bissel recounted Sestero's experiences on the set of The Room in the 2013 book The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside The Room, the Greatest Bad Movie Ever Made.

On its way to print, the story of The Room transformed from the object of affectionate ridicule to a thoughtful look at the challenges of making independent films and the friendship Sestero has with Wiseau. Whereas few critics would judge the frequently out-of-focus photography in The Room as cinematic art or adequate entertainment, the book earned strong notices.

Actor-director James Franco's new film adaptation of The Disaster Artist has received similarly affectionate notices. As of this writing, its RottenTomatoes.com score is at 95 percent, while the original film is stuck at a lowly 26 percent.

"The story behind this film is something I found fascinating," Sestero says, "and I thought if I could tell a story that is interesting and well-told, I could kind of make amends for being part of The Room, and that was kind of my goal. It was to show what it was like to follow your dream and face rejection.

"The Room didn't really emerge until 2009 as something that was being seen internationally. I was in Europe, working in print ads and television. The Room was off my radar until it re-entered my life."

While it might have been tempting to depict Wiseau, who sports a bizarre European accent that's difficult to place, as a talentless buffoon, Franco, who also plays Wiseau, treats him as a kindred spirit. Franco even cast his brother Dave as Sestero to replicate the sort of rapport strangers on a set simply don't have.

Similarly, the original actor says neither his book nor Franco's movie would have worked by simply ridiculing the ineptitude of The Room. Wiseau and Sestero were friends before the making of the film and remain so even after both have become bad movie icons.

"You have to really describe what the friendship was before you show how it bled into the making of such a strange movie," Sestero explains. "So I feel that was important with the book to go into the friendship part before you go into the making of The Room because you really need to explain how a movie like that could get made.

"They did a really good job of humanizing [Wiseau]," Sestero says of Franco's film, on which Sestero consulted. "I had a lot of behind-the-scenes footage and pictures from that time. I just kind of helped the production in any way that I could and just kind of give them as much material. They really kind of understood the story, so it was just kind of refreshing to let them adapt it and be a fan of it all."

Money Yells

It's hard to imagine a producer like Judd Apatow (who appears as a frustrated producer in The Disaster Artist) shelling out good money for Wiseau's novice script for The Room. So what did Wiseau have that made up for his lack of experiences or possibly skill?

"He had what we call in the business, 'f*** you money,' and he was able to do what he wanted and get across his own vision without anybody telling him no," Sestero recalls.

That said, Wiseau's inexperience shows up in just about every frame. Jon Favreau, Orson Welles and Charlie Chaplin had long resumes in film, radio or theater before taking on the multitasking that Wiseau engaged in during production of The Room. Both versions (film and book) of The Disaster Artist show how the stress of all his duties caused Wiseau to flub lines or make facial expressions unrelated to the scene at hand.

"I knew he was going to have his own vision for it, and I knew there was no way to change that, so you just kind of needed to let him do his own thing," Sestero says. "It's so original and out there that I think people respond to original material, I guess you could say."

He adds, "A lot of the reason The Room is watchable is that a lot of the people on the set were professionals, and they made something that's watchable, but the content and the acting is so strange that it's its own thing."

Outside the Room

That said, in The Disaster Artist, Franco (as Wiseau) and Wiseau himself play a scene after the closing credits that reveals that under the right circumstances, the previously ridiculed performer can act and deliver some funny put-downs.

"That's why in the new movie that Tommy and I made that I wrote for him (Best F(r)iends) -- it's the first movie we've made together in 15 years -- I gave him a part to give him a chance to shine as an actor because he hasn't really been given a chance. It's just about being put in the right part," Sestero says.

"It's kind of an L.A. noir story that's very, very strange, but Tommy's in a role that's taken seriously. That's the goal for it to give a new journey outside of The Room."

In addition to making The Room and Best F(r)iends together, Wiseau and Sestero have remained friends, even though the film and the book The Disaster Artist paint a warts-and-all portrait of Wiseau.

"We've been through a 20-year journey together, and we both kind of share the same passion. We're kind of survivors in a way. It's strange how we've been friends for so long being how different we are. I guess it's worked," he says.

Perhaps Wiseau is still working with and hanging out with Sestero because The Disaster Artist reveals where some of the things audiences yell at the movie come from and why there's a framed picture of a spoon on Johnny's coffee table, but he holds off on revealing where Wiseau comes from and the specific details on how he came into the money to make their film.

"I think the mystery is one of the biggest parts of The Room and Tommy. I think it's the engine of his success. Keeping the mystery is an important aspect of the phenomenon. I don't think you need to throw out too many details if they don't help move the story along."

MovieStyle on 12/08/2017

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